Emperor

Q:Are Chinese men really effeminate?

I ask because we have a picture of our obviously-female daughter on QZone. She's wearing a pink hat with flowers, holding a purse, and wearing a bunch of girly clothes.

Half of the people can't tell if she's a boy or girl. A quarter of them keep saying, "You have a handsome boy."

Our daughter does not look like a boy... not even close. Have decades of man-purse abuse and acting effeminate skewed Chinese men's perspective of male/female? Or are they projecting, hoping we only have a boy, so we won't be "cursed" with a girl?

For the record, all the girls realize she's a girl... it's the guys who are being derp.

Governor

I agree sometimes it is difficult to appreciate whether they are men or women. Most of them dont even have beard, and body hair, dont talk about the size down there. However they really think they are men because they have money and can treat their girlfriends.

Shifu

I think they become effeminate and cowards when they are not peasants.

In my previous neighborhood I have seen Chinese men catcalling foreigners when they are 5 and the foreigner alone, and yet they waited until they passed this foreigner, but the same men looking down the pavement when passing a foreigner without their 4 buddies, this is the pure definition of cowardice. At least uneducated older Chinese have the guts to shout right in your face when something goes wrong.

When it comes to being effeminate I am sorry but MEN DO NOT CARRY PURSES, it's anything but manly, also I know Chinese men who do beauty masks (you know the green paste on face) regularly and are afraid or any little scratch on their skin, let alone the ones who walk and talk like women when carrying their purse.

And the same men tell their counterparts to beware or foreign men, and some local women believe it.

Emperor

Hulk: Could they be uttering concealed insults on QQ, by claiming your half-half daughter doesn't look feminine enough? I'm sure you're wondering that. Just let the juvenilized chimps pat themselves on the backs: China is a poster-child of the harmful effects of neoteny run rampant: A culture of dependence, nobody taking responsibility for their lives, rigid thinking, selfishness, pettiness and so on. Who cares what they think. Adult features are not ugly, and remember that smooth Chinese baby-faces are usually accompanied by immature baby brains. Be strong, loud, proud, and disregard childish insults by these impotent lilliputters. Your daughter will fare well wherever she lives:www.vagabondjourney.com/china-has-turned-my-daughter-into-alpha-kid/

No. That little cutie belongs to some guy in Xiamen called Wade Shepard. Looks like he's the admin of that Vagabondjourney website too. Interesting fellow; worth meeting. Xiamen isn't far from Sichuan, so who knows...

Shifu

They see some Korean men acting like this and think it is fashionable. It is mostly men in big city trying to be "cool". You sometimes but not very often see men like this in the countryside. I guess their fathers tell them to act like a man. The city men see that the women here like the Korean boy bands so try to copy their style. It is as simple as that.

Yes but that's it, Korean Pop singers are effeminate but civilized and are cool, Chinese are not.

I lived in Korea before China and the Koreans I know, who are also very fashionable like their singers, shower or bath on a daily basis, they don't spit randomly, talk with their mouth full, spit bones and make racist remarks about foreigners right in their face because their mind is also in the 21st century and they know the importance of a good global image for their country's economy that is turned toward export.

Governor

I've seen plenty of Chinese men, especially younger men, with expensive, gaudy silk shirts, leather purses (with whatever fashion logo), expensive dress shoes, and other clothing that is far removed from the "rugged manliness" that's popular in the West.

My theory is that it's similar to the foppishness in the West back in the day. Teased out hair, long fingernails, heeled shoes, purses, expensive (and delicate) clothing all says, "I am not a laborer.", since it is wildly impractical to work wearing any of these. If you look at the actual laborers, they are dressed far more utilitarian (if you notice them... most of the physical workers go unnoticed).

In China, wealth is everything, and especially for men, who are valued by their ability to acquire money. Men show off that they are of the leisure class to attract women, and to jockey for social status, much like French aristocracy back before the Revolution (though, you could say the same for most of Europe back then), with their powdered wigs, silk shirts, high heeled shoes, and other fashioned that told the commoners, "I don't work in the fields". China still has a legacy of feudalism, and is highly class structured.

Consider the utterly Chinese fashion of men carrying their oversized wallets like American footballs, under their arms (or casually held with a few fingers). They're incredibly easy to steal, and take out the use of an arm/hand, completely impractical compared to stuffing a normal wallet in your pocket. However, they allow men to show off that they have money.

Forward Question

A: Going to HK would be the best bet I reckon, especially if you were loo

A:Going to HK would be the best bet I reckon, especially if you were looking for a church wedding. Chinese weddings are pretty grim IMO - you go to a barren govt dept with souless officials and navigate red tape so some guy can give you a red stamp and a marriage book. You get expensive pictures taken of you both posing in places you'd never go to in everyday life that is somehow supposed to represent your wedding, then a while later it's off to a restaurant where a game show host kind of guy makes sure it's as tacky as possible while the guests eat as fast as they can so they can leave as soon as they finish eating and gave you money. Hell, I'd go to Thailand or the Philippines and get married in Paradise. -- Stiggs